Amazon Web Services Expands in Japan

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Amazon Web Services (AWS) is expanding in Japan through the opening of a new availability zone. The move means that AWS will most likely be adding more data centers to keep up with the steady demand it has had since it first began offering its service in Tokyo 18 months ago.

AWS breaks its regions into availability zones. Each availability zone can encompass multiple data centers. For example, the AWS U.S. East region in Northern Virginia now occupies more than 10 data centers. That means it is likely AWS could be building new data centers in Japan for its new availability zone, as well as the two it opened since early 2011.

AWS is also giving a picture of the types of companies that are using AWS. According to the AWS blog, customers include Cookpad.com, the top recipe site in Japan, and KAO, a manufacturer of cosmetics and toiletries. The company recently migrated its corporate site to the AWS cloud. In addition they include a popular virtual city that recently received some publicity that resulted in an influx of “virtual” visitors.

AWS is the biggest, fastest-growing cloud service provider in the world. It is reported to be a billion dollar business and is far ahead of its competition. This next year will give us an idea of how big of a lead it can continue to enjoy. Google launched its cloud service earlier this summer and OpenStack continues its efforts to provide a community-built cloud infrastructure developed with technology from vendors, such as Rackspace, Canonical, and HP.